William Tite

Sir William Tite, CB (February 1798 – 20 April 1873) was an English architect who served as President of the Royal Institute of British Architects. He was particularly associated with various London buildings, with railway stations and cemetery projects.

Life

Tite was born in the City of London, in the parish of St Bartholomew the Great, in February 1798, the son of a Russia merchant named Arthur Tite.

He was articled to David Laing, architect of the new Custom House, and surveyor to the Parish of St Dunstan-in -the-East. Tite assisted Laing in the rebuilding of the church of St Dunstan: an article in the Architect in 1869 says that Tite entirely designed the new building, Laing himself having no knowledge of Gothic architecture. Between 1827 and 1828 he built the Scottish church at Regent Square in St Pancras, London, for Edward Irving, and ten years later collaborated with Charles Robert Cockerell in designing the London & Westminster Bank head office in Lothbury, also in the City.

The Royal Exchange, c. 1855

However, the rebuilding of the Royal Exchange, opened in 1844, was Tite's greatest undertaking. The previous building had been destroyed by fire in 1838, and a competition was held the following year. When this proved unproductive, a second limited competition was held between Tite, Charles Robert Cockerell, George Gwilt, Charles Barry and Robert Smirke. Tite's winning design had an imposing eight-column portico, inspired by the Pantheon in Rome, while the other sides of the building were based on Italian renaissance models.

Tite was the architect for the Eastern Counties, London and Blackwall, Gravesend and South Western Railways, and in France those between Paris and Rouen and Rouen and Le Havre; an article in the Architect named the station at Rouen, spanning nearly ninety feet, as an example of his structural skill.Tite designed many of the early railway stations in Britain, including:

• The termini of the London and South Western Railway at Vauxhall (Nine Elms), Southampton Terminus, Gosport and Windsor Riverside
• The termini of the London and Blackwall Railway at Minories and Blackwall (1840)
• Carnforth station, and Carlisle Citadel station (1847–1848)
• The majority of the stations on the Caledonian and Scottish Central railways, including Edinburgh (1847–1848) and Perth (1847–1848)
• Barnes, Barnes Bridge, Chiswick and Kew Bridge railway stations (1849)
• Stations between Yeovil and Exeter, including Axminster and the now-demolished Honiton.

As a company director of the South Metropolitan Cemetery Company he laid out his first cemetery at Norwood in 1836 and designed several significant monuments and chapels there. While previous cemetery designs had followed a classical style, Tite's design was the first to employ the Gothic revival alongside landscaping, which was subsequently judged to be the archetype for future cemeteries. Between 1853 and 1854, with Sydney Smirke, he landscaped Brookwood Cemetery near Woking in Surrey for the London Necropolis Company. Between 1858 and 1859 he built a memorial church in the Byzantine style at Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire.

Maintaining his associations with railways, this cemetery was served by a dedicated line from London Necropolis railway station, next to Waterloo station, in central London.

Tite's active work ceased about twenty years before his death (in recognition of his contributions, however, he was awarded the RIBA Royal Gold Medal in 1856).^{[citation needed]}

In 1851 he visited Italy after a grave illness. In 1854 he contested Barnstaple unsuccessfully as a Liberal, but in the following year was returned as Member of Parliament for Bath, which he represented until his death. He keenly opposed Sir George Gilbert Scott's proposal to build the new Foreign and Commonwealth Office and other government buildings adjacent to the Treaury in Whitehall in the Gothic style. In 1869 he was knighted, and in 1870 was made a Companion of the Bath. Tite had a wide knowledge of English literature and was a good linguist and a lover of old books. He was a elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1835, and of the Society of Antiquaries in 1839. He was President of the Camden Society and of the Institute of British Architects.

He was a director of the London and Westminster Bank and Governor of the Bank of Egypt; in 1856 he was nominated a member of the Select Committee on the Bank Charter. He was a member of the Metropolitan Board of Works, a magistrate of Middlesex and Somerset and Deputy-Lieutenant for London. He was also a Governor of St. Thomas's Hospital, London, where he is commemorated the William Tite Scholarship, for the best student in the first year, with the highest aggregate marks in Anatomy and Physiology. After over 125 years, this prize has been subsumed into Kings College London, where it is still awarded for excellence in the pre-clinical medical course.^{[citation needed]}

He died on 20 April 1873 and was laid to rest in the catacombs of his South Metropolitan Cemetery. Tite Street, which runs north-west from London's Chelsea Embankment, is named after him. Tite was a member of the Metropolitan Board of Works, largely responsible for the construction of Chelsea Embankment.^{[citation needed]}

Gallery of architectural work

• 

  Royal Exchange, London

• 

  Aerial View, Royal Exchange, London

• 

  Portico, Royal Exchange, London

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  Gothic entrance, West Norwood Cemetery

References

• S. P. Parissien Tite, Sir William (1798–1873) Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (subscription needed)

Attribution

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Tite, Sir William". Encyclopædia Britannica. 26 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 1019. 

External links

• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by William Tite
•  "Tite, William". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900. 
• 41 Lothbury, London & Westminster Bank building, now refurbished as serviced offices
• Friend of West Norwood Cemetery
• Hansard 1803–2005: contributions in Parliament by William Tite

Parliament of the United Kingdom
Preceded by George Treweeke Scobell and Thomas Phinn	Member of Parliament for Bath 1855–1873 With: George Treweeke Scobell, to 1857 Sir Arthur Elton, 1857–1865 Arthur Edwin Way, 1859–1865 James Macnaghten McGarel-Hogg, 1865–1868 Donald Dalrymple from 1868	Succeeded by The Viscount Chelsea and Donald Dalrymple